Carnival Corporation & plc is growing its fleet yet again: The company has ordered three new vessels for a new class of ships that will sail under the Carnival Cruise Line brand. Once completed, they¡¯ll be the largest vessels in the Carnival Corporation fleet¡ªwith enough room to carry nearly 8,000 guests at full capacity.

The 3,000-stateroom ships will be nearly 230,000 gross tonnes and will be powered by liquefied natural gas. They¡¯re being constructed by Italian shipbuilder Fincantieri and are scheduled for delivery in the summers of 2029, 2031 and 2033.

The company didn¡¯t reveal many details about the new ship class, but plans to share more information soon. The new ship order is contingent upon financing, which the company expects to complete later this year.

"We are proud to be known as America's cruise line with tremendous guest loyalty and an outstanding team that has enabled us to deliver memorable vacations to over 100 million guests," says Christine Duffy, president of Carnival Cruise Line. "For this next generation ship, we are focused on creating innovative guest experiences that will take Carnival Cruise Line into the future with new fun features and excitement that we know our guests will love."

So far in 2024, Carnival Cruise Line has ordered five new ships. In February and March, the company also announced that it had ordered two more Excel-class ships to join the fleet in 2027 and 2028. In addition, Carnival will take over five total vessels from its sister brands between 2023 and March 2025, including a pair of vessels from P&O Cruises Australia, which is being sunsetted.?

¡°We are doubling down on the growth of Carnival Cruise Line¡ªour highest-returning brand¡ªto keep up with the incredibly strong demand we continue to see for the world's most popular cruise line,¡± says Josh Weinstein, chief executive officer of Carnival Corporation & plc. ¡°At this point, our newbuild pipeline is just one delivery in each of 2025, 2027, 2028, 2029, 2031 and 2033. We continue to take a disciplined approach to growth, strategically directing new capacity to the areas of highest demand at a rate of one to two new ships per year.¡±

For shareholders, the new ship orders should be good news. The company¡¯s overall measured capacity growth between 2025 and 2033 will be an average of 1.5 percent a year, per Weinstein.

¡°This gives us the headroom to strategically provide new capacity to the brands in our portfolio like Carnival Cruise Line, which provide outsized returns while continuing to execute against our responsible capital strategy, using our strong free cash flow over the next several years to improve our balance sheet, significantly reduce our debt and continue to transfer value from debt holders to shareholders," he adds.

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